Review – Laurie Black: Deadly Synths

By Lucas McCall

Have you ever wanted to sit in a dark room, close your eyes, and feel like you’re travelling through time into the future? With Deadly Synths you can! From Donna Summer to Faithless and more, starting in the 60’s with Moog, Laurie Black takes us on a riveting adventure through the seven decades of synthesisers.

Playing songs from each decade, at times with a gothic twist, Laurie leads us through the timeline. Synths booming in the 80’s through house, techno, and industrial music, continuing to flourish and fill gaps throughout the 90’s and 2000’s, before taking an interesting loop in the 2010’s: trying to imitate the 80’s again. She shares the irony of synths almost being banned in the 80’s, as people believed they were taking orchestral jobs away. You would now struggle to find a new pop song not using a synthesiser. Black wraps off the show in the current decade, showing us the future of synths, playing her own original songs, Axis and Cosmic Indifference.

Black proves that despite synths being so mainstream now, live synth players are still taking risks. Sometimes a piece of tech is just a piece of tech and will jump out of time, making them hard to play live even for a classically trained pianist. However, you couldn’t dream of such a performance from a backing track. Seeing such an unconventional instrument being played live brings a whole new level to performing and witnessing Laurie’s connection to her synth was enthralling. Playing this machine as if it was an extension of her own body, she gave the audience her heart and soul.

Her performance was captivating, and her passion is contagious. Not a single person in the room stayed still. And how could they? When you are being transported from past to present, then into the future, all you want to do is tap your feet and have a boogie.

Black takes the time to emphasise the importance of taking risks, of going home and making your own music (there’s plenty of synth emulators online!) and most importantly, supporting small and local artists. With seven new stadiums built and around 100 grassroots venues closed over the past year in the UK, this is more important than ever.

Fancy supporting your new favourite synth artist? Catch Laurie Black on tour in Glasgow or Edinburgh later this month.